


There's a Wocket In My Pocket

by velvetcadence



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Family Feels, Family Fluff, Fix-It, Gen, M/M, Mansion Fic, Mpreg, Self Confidence Issues, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-08
Updated: 2013-12-08
Packaged: 2018-01-04 00:30:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1074907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/velvetcadence/pseuds/velvetcadence
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Raven had known that Erik and Charles shared a peculiar friendship that was more intense than most.</p><p>Or, Raven's family through the years.</p><p>(Secret Mutant Gift for Listerinezero)</p>
            </blockquote>





	There's a Wocket In My Pocket

**Author's Note:**

  * For [listerinezero](https://archiveofourown.org/users/listerinezero/gifts).



_Westchester, 1962_

Raven had known that Erik and Charles shared a peculiar friendship that was more intense than most. It was evident by the way they gravitated towards each other whenever they happened to be in the same room. ‘Kept themselves in each other’s pockets’ as the term went. Raven had known instinctively that Erik was becoming someone important to Charles, and yet...perhaps a part of her didn’t want to see it.

Part of it stemmed from jealousy as Charles’ only friend until then. Another part lay in her burgeoning crush on the mysterious man with the propensity for turtlenecks and a gaze as sharp as broken glass.

“You’re beautiful,” Erik had told her after he kissed her, that night she’d snuck into his bed looking for validation. “But it’s not my approval you should be looking for.”

“Then whose?” She spat out with surprising vehemence. “Charles?”

“No,” Erik said simply, holding her gaze. “Yours.”

She stiffened as the statement struck her, and he left her there to gather her clothes and her wits.

When Erik closed the door behind him and the dust had settled, Raven broke down. It was a grief that was beyond tears, a pain beyond any kind of reckoning. She was just so tired, of hiding, of arguing, of being scared—so she allowed herself this moment of weakness. Bones became stronger after a fracture, after all.

 

Afterwards she looked at her skin—her real skin, the one that was scaled and patterned like a reptile’s—and the gleam of it in the dim lamplight made her defiant. Erik took what he wanted when he wanted it; so why not simply take the freedom Charles had long denied her? Resolute, she made her way down to the kitchens where Charles was undoubtedly having his nighttime tea.

Raven passed Hank's room down the hallway. She could tell he was still awake from the dim light escaping through the crack of the door. She had trusted him to see her despite her skin, and maybe love her because of it. It had been an exercise in caution not to knock and ask to come in as she usually did.

Preoccupied as she was, nothing could truly have prepared her for the sight of her brother and Erik locked in a lover’s embrace against the kitchen counter. Erik always seemed to know where anyone was coming and going from tracking the rivets of their jeans and their watches, but this time he seemed to be oblivious of everything except for Charles.

It was a painfully vulnerable moment. Raven stared in morbid fascination as Charles swept his palm down the length of Erik’s spine. _Look away!_ her mind clamored, the gesture both too familiar and alien. It simply wasn’t feasible for two men to be intimate like this. Raven hadn’t even considered that their friendship could be kindled by lust, but it made a great amount of sense, in retrospect.

After a beat, Charles tilted his head in her direction, even with Erik’s head tucked into his shoulder, a wordless acknowledgement. The other man tensed, sensing only now her presence, but Charles’ hand tightened on Erik's nape; keeping him grounded, contained like a hooded eagle.

Erik turned his head so he could see her at his periphery, and they stayed like that for a long while, frozen like some strange tableau.

 

* * *

_Westchester, 1968_

Now Raven watched as Charles settled his palm at the base of Erik’s spine, lending warmth to where his back must have been aching. Raven remembered pregnancy well when she had Kurt, how her insides shifted until she felt like her body wasn’t even truly hers (a terrifying concept especially for a shapeshifter, who could manipulate her own body at will). She wondered how much worse it had been for Erik to realize that his body was doing the biologically impossible.

“We truly are the superior race,” he had murmured in awe, staring at his navel as Hank ran through test after test after test only to confirm what they already knew.

 

“I should have known,” Charles had confided in her later that night, over a mug of chamomile to soothe his nerves. They were at their favorite spot in the kitchen and Raven was nursing a creamy concoction of cocoa. Charles had smiled at her drink, remembering not the failures of the childhood that they’d shared but its triumphs.

“Should have known what?”

Charles shrugged, sipping thoughtfully at his tea. “That something was different. He’s been acting strange for the last couple of weeks, you know. Strange dreams, even stranger appetites. When he started getting sick in the mornings I should have known it wasn’t just a stomach bug. I’d thought it was the weather that was keeping him in bed ‘til late, but…” He shook his head. “At least it’s not an illness.”

“Just a pregnancy,” Raven quirked her eyebrow. Charles licked his lips.

“Yes. Just a pregnancy, of all things.”

They continued in silence for the next long while. After a moment, Charles started to giggle quietly to himself. Raven watched worriedly as it evolved into hysterical laughter and blurred into a panic attack.

“Are you okay?”

Charles muffled his disbelieving laughter with a hand. “My god, Raven, I’m going to be a father!”

“You are,” Raven repeated with a wide smile. “And you’re going to be so great at it. Congratulations, Charles!”

 

Her brother was beside himself with joy every time the baby kicked now, and though Erik looked wan, he also looked calmer. More settled. The extra weight he’d begun to carry from the baby looked good on him, padding the sharp points of his body into rounder, softer edges. Some of the kids thought better of him now that he no longer looked as menacing. Ororo especially appreciated the softer quality of his hugs as she was doing so now, tucked in the curve of Erik’s arm.

“ _There’s a Wocket in My Pocket_ ,” Erik read, waiting patiently for Kurt to turn the page so that he could continue. Most of their students had returned to their homes for the holidays, so the mansion was quieter than usual. The older children had taken a trip downtown to see a film under the supervision of Alex and Janos. The little ones opted to stay at home and be read to, and it helped that Moira had promised them the first batch of gingerbread cookies.

 

* * *

_Westchester, 1962_

"What the fuck, Charles?"

"Please, Raven. Language." Charles had the gall to berate her for it when he was standing in their kitchen with his _arms around another man_.

"You're—with him—" She gaped at them. "Why didn't you tell me! And you! How dare you kiss me when my brother—why would you even—"

"Will you _calm your mind_?" Charles ground out forcefully. He had let Erik go, but the other man had yet to step away. Raven frowned at him. Had they always stood so closely like this?

"I thought I told you not to read my mind," Raven crossed her arms.

"And I haven't. I've kept my promises," Charles placated, making the unfortunate mistake of of finally noticed her state of dress. "Good lord, pu—put some clothes on. Erik, don't look."

"Charles, she shouldn't have to hide who she is."

"Stop staring, you oaf. And I very well know my sister can look as she pleases. But Raven, you're naked. You'll catch a cold like that."

"Erik told me a tiger shouldn't have to hide his stripes."

Charles whipped his head at Erik with a stern look. "Tigers and young women are very different things. I don't know what's gotten into you lately, I thought you've been happy. Then you come in looking like this and I don't know what to think."

"Looking like this? What, blue? You know, Charles, I thought it would be you and me against the world. But no matter how bad the world gets, you don't want to be against it, you want to be part of it."

"What's wrong with wanting to be part of it?"

"The world only wants to see what they want to see! They don't want monsters and they're never going to accept us! They're never going to accept _me_!"

The silence was stifling after her outburst. Raven felt like she was coming apart at the seams again. Charles stared at her like he was beginning to comprehend. 

"Oh, _Raven_ ," He whispered tenderly. "Come here."

She turned away. "Don't touch me, Charles."

"I'll hug you if I want to. That's my brotherly right."

"You're full of shi—poop." When he enveloped her in his arms, it felt like she had forgotten what his hugs felt like. She didn't want to admit it, but she missed him inexorably. 

There was still so much more to resolve, so much more to protest. But Charles managed to say the right words at the right time for once. "I think you're beautiful the way you are."

"Don't lie."

"I'm not," he squeezed her meaningfully. "Why is it that the people I love most don't think they're good enough when I think the world of them?"

"You're a fool, Charles," Erik whispered quietly, strangely fond. Raven had almost forgotten he was still in the room.

"Yes," Her brother smiled. "But I'm yours."

Raven squeezed him back, knowing that 'yours' meant he was _her_ fool as well. Just as she was his.

* * *

 

_Westchester, 1965_

When Raven had found out she was pregnant, she worried immensely. As far as she knew, Azazel was in some distant part of South America doing god-knew-what. He hadn’t visited once after the end of their brief love affair, and as the baby grew larger, she fretted over it not having a father in its life. She needn’t have worried, though, because while Kurt may not have had his biological father with him, he had Charles and Erik. Charles was hilariously out-of-depth with newborns, but he had a gift for nurturing young souls. Erik was surprisingly tender when it came to children.

“Hold him like this,” He instructed when she had Kurt in her arms for the first time. Of all the people she knew it was he who had been the one who had taught her how to feed the baby, how to burp him, and even how to change his diapers.

She regretted it when she asked, “How do you know so much about babies?” backtracking when a look of pain crossed his face. “Sorry.”

Erik shook his head as if he was shaking cobwebs out of it. “I had a daughter. But that was a long time ago.” That was all he would say on the matter. Kurt, her little angel, had decided that he was hungry and gave a great wail; the matter was soon forgotten.

 

* * *

_Westchester, 1968_

At present, Erik’s soft voice was filling the room, lulling everyone into a comfortable state. Kurt was already asleep on his chest, and Ororo looked well on her way to following him. “... _And the zillow on my pillow. I don’t care if you believe it. That’s the kind of house I live in_.”

Charles dropped a kiss on the top of Erik’s head as he passed by the back of the couch to stoke the fire. Raven couldn’t see it, but she could hear the smile in the cadence of Erik’s voice, as palpable as the warmth filling her from the inside out.

“ _And I hope we never leave it._ ” 

**Author's Note:**

> Happy holidays, everyone! And thank you Listerinezero for the lovely prompts! I smushed them together since I couldn't choose exactly one.
> 
> The title comes from There's a Wocket in My Pocket by Dr. Seuss.


End file.
